Hamilton: a year 2017 full of records

The 2017 season of F1 may have been marked by a number of overtakings halved compared to the previous year, but the drivers remained at their best if the statistics from the end of the year are to be believed.

The most prominent is certainly Lewis Hamilton who won his fourth title by winning nine victories in 20 Grands Prix, a ratio of almost 50%. The pilot Mercedes notably dominated the second part of the season with a series of three successes at Spa-Francorchamps (Belgium), Monza (Italy) and Singapore. The Briton could even have achieved a series of six victories with his first places acquired at Suzuka (Japan) and Austin (USA) if he had not finished second at Sepang (Malaysia).

Lewis Hamilton became the first Briton to become a four-time F1 world champion. Only five drivers have achieved this performance in the history of the discipline with Michael Schumacher (7), Juan Manuel Fangio (5), Sebastian Vettel (4) et Alain Prost (4). He became the record holder for poles with 72 qualifying victories.

He also matched the performance of Jim Clark and Alberto Ascari by achieving three “Grand Slams” with pole, victory, fastest lap in the race and all laps in the lead.

Beyond this incredible domination, due in part to the excellent performances of the Mercedes W08, Lewis Hamilton was also able to benefit from the exemplary reliability of his Silver Arrow since he was the only driver to score points in all the calendar races. Only Juan Manuel Fangio and Michael Schumacher had managed to win the title by achieving such a feat.

His last retirement was at the 2016 Malaysian GP where he had to dismount due to engine failure. He subsequently made up for it with a 3rd place in Japan preceding a series of four consecutive victories which was nevertheless insufficient to prevent his former teammate Nico Rosberg from being crowned.